Colleen
Feminine · “girl”
Colleen is overwhelmingly a girls’ name — 162,754 girls against 330 boys since 1880.
Colleen is not an Irish name. It is the Irish word for a girl, borrowed by English speakers who mistook a common noun for a personal name — and it is scarcely ever given in Ireland itself.
How old is the name Colleen?
Colleen first appears in US birth records in 1901 — 124 years ago. The typical Colleen alive today was born around 1965, making them about 60 years old. About 135,000 people named Colleen are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Colleen most popular?
Colleen peaked in 1965, reaching #93 nationally. Today it ranks #2822, 2,729 places below that high. See the whole 1965 chart.
Colleen appears on these lists:
Where it comes from
From caile to Colleen
The story of Colleen
English writers used the word colleen for an Irish girl throughout the nineteenth century — in ballads, in Boucicault's enormously popular play The Colleen Bawn, and in the sentimental verse of the Irish diaspora. American families of Irish descent took it as a name in the twentieth century, and it rose sharply through the 1940s, peaking in the mid-1950s. Irish families have almost never used it.
Meaning
girl
From the Irish cailín, 'girl' or 'young woman', a diminutive of caile. English borrowed the word itself in the eighteenth century as 'colleen' and used it in poetry and song for an Irish girl; the given name comes from that borrowing rather than from any Irish naming tradition.
How the name formed
- caile
- cailín
- colleen
- Colleen
Related forms: Cailín · Coleen · Collene
Pronouncing Colleen
kuh-LEEN
Two syllables, stress on the second. The Irish cailín is said kal-EEN, which is close.
Nicknames for Colleen
Moderate
What the data says
146 years of official birth records
The long climb, and where it stands now
The same years in position rather than babies
- First recorded
- 1901
- Most girls named
- 19604,450 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #93reached in 1965
- Change vs 2022
- 0.0%60 in 2025, from 60
Rank is a position, a count is a headcount, and they move independently — a name can hold its rank while the number of babies behind it falls. Source: U.S. Social Security Administration.
Colleen in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Cailín in Irish — related form
- Coleen in English — spelling variant
- Collene in English — spelling variant
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Texas, Ohio.
Colleens among us
people named Colleen are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 26,788 born in 2025 was named Colleen
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Is it right for you
What happens to a name after it peaks
The Margie test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Colleen's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Margie climbed just as high around 1933, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Margie's path sketches the road Colleen is walking now.
Colleen sits in the calm middle of the cycle — neither chasing a wave nor sliding off one. Middle-of-the-cycle names age slowly and predictably.
A scored estimate from 146 years of naming cycles — not a prophecy. Great names outlive statistics. How this is scored
Where Colleen is headed
Colleen should hold steady through 2030 — the curve is flat, and flat curves are the most predictable kind.
Medium confidence — fitted on official counts through 2025.
A damped-trend projection of the official birth data — a sketch of momentum, not a promise. Every name's forecast, ranked.
Colleen beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Colleen in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- The meaning is transparent and the Irish word behind it is entirely genuine.
- The end stress gives it a distinct rhythm against a front-stressed surname.
- It is instantly recognizable as Irish-American without being difficult.
- It is a common noun rather than a name in Ireland, and Irish speakers notice.
- It is closely dated to the middle of the twentieth century in American records.
Nobody names a baby alone.
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What they receive
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Colleen
Feminine · #2822 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Colleens are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 135,000 people named Colleen are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Colleen in 2025?
- Colleen ranks #2822 among US girl names in 2025, with 60 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Colleen?
- About 1 in every 26,788 US girls born in 2025 was named Colleen — 60 in all.
- Will my child share the name Colleen with classmates?
- Colleen will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Colleen
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Lya#2822 · Roxanna#2822 · Kensington#2822 · Maybelle#2822 · Hayat#2822 · Seven#2822 · Livie#2822 · Haniya#2822
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Colleen? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Colleen and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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